Comments on: Unrest In The Kitty Hive

By: Greg

Greg — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 23:53:00 +0000

I am a first year beekeeper in central Ohio and I am experiencing the exact same thing that you are. I am scraping the queen cells away and hoping that they don’t swarm. My queen cells are at the bottom of frmes which means that they are wanting to swarm. I had a super on for about a week after first discovering the cells. Our state bee inspector came by to inspect and found more cells and suggested that I split the hive. I decide not to. He told me to begin to feed them again since it is so dry here and the nctar is drying up. I did that and removed the super. I will be looking in the hive tomorrow and see what is going on now. I also posted on our central ohio beekeepers site asking for advice. Let me know how you are making out. my email is pife101@yahoo.com. the hive is very healthy and the frames in the deep hive bodies are probably 60-70% full. I am moving frames from the outboard areas into the inboard to give them more room. I suspect that honey is out of the question for this year. the inspector said that there are onlya couple weeks of nectar left and they have to get ready for winter soon. Keep me posted.

Greg

By: Dea

Dea — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 09:06:00 +0000

Thanks for answering, Sharon. I think I have an affection for the delightful little bumblebees (very aptly named, no?) but I’m glad to hear there are thousands of honey-producing species in N.America. Keep up the good work, and the posts about being an apiarist, please!

Italians, eh? Very passionate, from what I hear. Perhaps that accounts for the unorthodox frame development.

By: ChicagoLady

ChicagoLady — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 02:22:00 +0000

I remember hearing on the radio just a few days ago, that the U.S. is now outsourcing honey to China. Apparently, we don’t have enough honey producing bees here in the U.S., and there are a lot more bee hives in China to supply us with honey. So keep those hives going, Sharon!

Denise

By: birdchick

birdchick — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 20:09:00 +0000

Every time I check the hives, I do an update. It serves as a good notebook for me to remember what I did last tie I was out and will be a record book for the future. I'm amazed at how popular the bee entries are, was not anticipating that.

I must say that I'm having a tough time not cracking open Kitty to see what's happening, but I need to give them time to work the new frames we put in to expand the hive.

dea,

Not a silly question at all. Honey bees are in the order hymoneptra and there are over 17,000 species in North America (and that doesn't include the false bees). The bees you are describing sound like bumble bees. The honeybees (like the ones I keep) produce the most honey and there are several types, I have an Italian race, but there others including Russian, African, and German. European honeybees produce the most honey and were introduced to North America. Bumblebees are native to North America and produce honey, but not very much. You can buy special housing for them, and many people encourage them for pollination--we need all we can get.

By: Dea

Dea — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 06:02:00 +0000

Probably a very silly question, but…

I’m used to thinking of honey bees as the gambolling, fuzzy kind. Yours seem very sleek and not so fuzzy. Do all kinds of bees make honey? What kind do you have?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 25 Jun 2007 03:39:00 +0000

Good luck on the bee situation but you do know super markets sell honey in bear shape containers.(-:

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 18:23:00 +0000

Please keep us updated on the bees. We do love seeing the pictures and learning more about them.